Not all marketing programs require extensive analysis or an R&D investment to aid in growth of business. Some are simple, easy and cost as little as time it takes to make a phone call.

One practice I wish that every CEO and senior executive within any company would learn is importance and power of routinely communicating with customer. I didn't learn this lesson until late in my career, but I can tell you it became a valuable business habit.

Weekly I would call between 3-10 customers. Even when I was traveling, I would carve out time to make my customer calls. My targets were accounts that recently received products from us. I found it to be a golden opportunity for me to take customer's pulse on how we performed. At same time I would have senior people that reported directly to me do same. Our company had about 5000 total accounts. Between my staff and me we were able to make about 30-40 calls per week. This meant we could essentially contact about 50% of our accounts per year. I can assure you we learned a tremendous amount about our customers and our customer service level. And did so at a negligible cost - basically price of a phone call.

Here's 5 tips to making most of your niche marketing campaigns ...

1) Define your niche market.

What, specifically, do your current customers have in common? In what unique way do you satisfy needs of aforementioned, compared to your competitors?

2) Find out what your niche market buys and wants.

The best way to find out is to ... ask them!

Add a survey to your site, send one out to your lists, visit niche related forums, bulletin boards, and newsgroups and post your queries.

3) Offer products your niche wants.

Develop your own product/service, or find existing ones, that satisfy needs you've defined from your research.

4) Get focused!

Create your unique selling proposition, site content, and advertising campaigns based solely on these specific demographics.